


Courtesy Call

by JaneAire



Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Dead Girl Walking AU, First Time, Gladio is awful at pick up lines, Gladnis, Kissing, Lots of kissing like a lot buckle down, M/M, Making Out, Mild Smut, Noctis hate, Sharing a Bed, Swearing, What tense did I even write this in, injuries, mentions of sexual situations, not proof read
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-05
Updated: 2017-09-05
Packaged: 2018-12-24 03:49:23
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,807
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12004383
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JaneAire/pseuds/JaneAire
Summary: After having what appears to be a dreadful day in what seems to be a miserable life, Ignis decides to take Gladio up on an offer that may or may not have been a joke in the first place.The Dead Girl Walking AU no one asked for





	Courtesy Call

Ignis has to remind himself not to flip the car. 

He was going over the speed limit--not intentionally, of course--watching the streetlights streak the wet pavement into rivers of red, green, and gold. 

He was supposed to keep a level head. It was his damn job to bite his tongue to save face, nod loyally, move on. _Yes, Your Highness. Of course, Highness. Would it kill you to put your bloody underpants in the hamper, You Royal Pain in My Ass?_ He wasn't supposed to get so riled up over the inconveniencing antics of a seventeen year old boy and his sidekick, but Ignis couldn't fathom why he was suddenly seeing _red_ over something so trivial as the fact that Noctis had spilled orange soda in his room. 

Then left it. For days. 

He was half convinced it was the monotony, the thanklessness of it all. Four hours of sleep a night amounted little when it came to seeing to Noctis; for a boy who moved like a sloth, he had the ability to sweep through his apartment like a hurricane. Noctis was...less than appreciative, at least vocally. Then again, Noctis was always deadpan. It was unnerving to say the least, and had concerned Ignis for some time. He'd catch it sometimes--a faint laugh, not a chuckle, a real laugh and a fragment of a smile as he and Prompto picked at each other over a magazine. 

Prompto was good for Noctis, Ignis knew. 

Prompto was less good at keeping Noct focused on his studies and his duties (Ignis refused to think about the state of his bedroom, it's enough to give him a stroke here at the wheel), but he keeps Noctis happy when Ignis couldn't. It's more than he could've asked for. 

It didn't mean Noctis didn't drive Ignis up a bloody wall, his hands going white knuckled over the steering wheel, leaving black streaks on the wet pavement as the light turns green. 

He wanted to blame the other half on Gladio, their conversation this morning and the fact their sparring had left Ignis' right side covered in a colorful display of bruises--Gladio had looked at him a funny way in the locker room as Ignis has folded a towel around his waist a little tighter, pushing his wet hair back from his eyes. Gladio had tapped his own side, grinning fondly. _"Iris calls 'em watercolor tattoos. Says they're artistic."_

_"She's clearly never sparred you at full force."_

Gladio raised his eyebrows. _"Oh, sugar, I went easy on you."_

Ignis hated it when Gladiolus did that--the pet names, unprofessional to say the least. Ignis spun, sliding his tank top over his wet skin, grimacing as it stuck to his shoulders. It made Ignis feel like Gladio knew something he didn't. 

Ignis didn't like not knowing. 

_"Those gotta hurt like a bitch, though,"_ Gladio had ammended, now nearly dressed himself, sliding on sweats--why shower, Ignis wondered, if you were going to continue to dress like you'd spend the day sparring? He probably would. Perhaps the shower was to appease Ignis' sense of cleanliness. 

Gladio grinned, suddenly, the whiteness of it cutting across his dark face like a knife, and Ignis immediately felt it again--the helplessness of being unsure, uncertain. _"I can make it up to you, if ya want?"_

It isn't really a question, and that's the thing that unsettled Ignis the most. Surely he didn't expect him to say yes, not knowing? 

He was daring him to accept. 

Ignis didn't take steps into the darkness--if Gladio wanted something, he'd have to ask. Ignis simply quirked an eyebrow, daring Gladio to explain himself. The taller boy kept his grin--even with his hair wet, Ignis noticed there were curls budding at the nape of his neck. It had been months since he'd trimmed it (Ignis had even offered to cut it for him) and, if Ignis was honest, it was beginning to bother him, the unruliness of it, the way it curled against the soft brown skin of his neck. 

Gladio knew it bothered him. 

_"I just meant--an ice pack at my place? Some coffee? I've got a kit back at my place for pulled muscles, too, and you seem a little stiff here."_ He used two fingers to tap at his pulse, his smile suddenly exchanged for a sincere gaze. _"Only if you wanna."_

Ignis paused, turning toward his locker to tease his hair with his fingers--to get out the tangles, of course, despite the fact Gladio was  watching. _"Ice and coffee?"_

Gladio grinned again, and Ignis felt his stomach drop as Gladio slammed his locker door closed, dropping his head so that a single curl teased his temple, liberally distracting Ignis more than he was willing to admit. _"Ice and coffee. They don't call me the fireman for nothin'."_

Ignis paused. He'd clearly missed something.  Go back. _"The fireman?"_

Gladio rose, replacing his snapback over his unruly hair and slung his gym bag over his shoulder. He was thumbing at his jaw, and Ignis noticed for the first time the shadow that was creeping there--Gladio was most likely shaving regularly, much to Noctis' chagrin. Ignis didn't mind either way--not growing as much hair meant he didn't have to shave, which meant for time for...Noctis, unfortunately. 

Gladio placed his hand on the door, not sparing Ignis a glance over his shoulder, but nonetheless could make out the curl of the shield's lip from the distance. _"Yeah. I find 'em hot and I leave 'em wet."_

\----

Ignis had been reeling for hours afterward, unfocused during nearly half the meetings he'd attended. The joke had been unprofessional at least and treasonous at most--was it lawful to flirt with an advisor to the prince? Was it even flirting? It could've been an ill-timed joke, a dare to see if Ignis would fall for it. Wouldn't the glaives just die laughing? 

Ignis had decided to ignore it. He'd had plans that night for a case file and a cup of ebony. 

He didn't understand how he'd ended up pissed off and shaking in the rain at the door to Gladio's apartment, banging in a way that was uncharacteristic and rude--he would've reprimanded Noctis for such a behavior, but he couldn't stop it. It had little to do with the water slicking his suit jacket, probably ruining it and chilling his skin to an obscene degree, and more to do with his quest for truth--what Gladio meant by his comments this afternoon, what he meant by asking Ignis if he was miserable all the time. 

If Ignis was being truthful with himself--and he strove to be, always--he was a little desperate. 

He wanted to be somewhere else, someone else for an hour, just once. The Ignis that could've been, should've been Gladio had once called it. The Ignis that didn't live his life to operate someone else's. The Ignis who was selfish. 

Gladio didn't know--and most of the time, Ignis didn't want him too--that Ignis was selfish. 

God, he wanted to be selfish. 

"Hold on! I'm comin'!" 

Ignis felt almost silly, suddenly, very aware that his suit was soaked and his shoes were now boats and the fact that his hair had fallen into his eyes. Besides, Gladio hadn't meant it. It had been a joke at Ignis' expense. This was unprofessional, practically treasonous, and they could both be in trouble-- 

"Ignis?"

He tried very hard to stay calm, staring back cooly at Gladio's amber eyes, wide and soft at the same time, his thick eyebrows furrowed low in concern. (Ignis hated that, too--the way Gladio always looked at him like there's something deserving of pity there.) 

"Were you expecting someone else?" Ignis sighed cooly, glancing over Gladio's shoulder into the apartment, trying to gauge what he'd interrupted. (He'd been right, though. Gladio hadn't expected him). 

Unless he had, in which case, it made Ignis' stomach jump realizing Gladio was simply in a pair of navy cotton joggers. Period, end of sentence, nothing more. It wasn't as if Ignis hadn't seen him in less--touched him in less, knocked the shit out of him in less--but something about him tensed and slack-jawed, standing bathed in the warm light of his foyer that made it suddenly real to Ignis. 

"Uh," Gladio said, his mouth still hanging open, staring at Ignis. Ignis can't tell if it's the rosy lighting from the apartment, or if he's been drinking, but Gladio's cheeks are a soft pink, along with the tips of his ears and the crest of his chest. 

"Is this a bad time, Gladiolus?" Ignis asked, keeping in mind to bear an amused tone as opposed to a more candid apologetic one. 

"No!" Gladio yelped, nearly slamming himself in the head with his door as he swung it open. "Shit, sorry, you're freezin'. Come in."

There was no entry rug--Ignis made a mental note to buy him one as a thank you for...whatever this night turned out to be--and Ignis was careful step out of his wet loafers, leaving them by the door, but Gladio is already surprising him by digging his warm fingers under the collar of his suit jacket and pulling it down Ignis' arms. 

"I'll hang it--" 

"Don't bother, it'll have to be sent to the cleaner."

"Right," Gladio grumbled, throwing it over a kitchen stool. 

The apartment was small--Ignis hadn't been inside it before, but had seen pictures. Gladio had only moved in recently, maybe five months ago, Ignis hadn't bother to keep track. It's one room--a kitchen top separating a small cooking space (Ignis could touch the counter on one side and the wall on the other if he wanted to--he doesn't, it would be rude) and the rest of the room was a clutter of boxes, a single mattress with a fitted sheet on the floor, a television across from it also on the bare wood floor. A balcony with paisley drapes Ignis was positive Gladio didn't pick out (or, at least, hoped to the Six he didn't). 

Ignis stayed standing, unsure where it to sit--it's obvious Gladio lounges on the bed (which was currently a mess of tangled sheets, a book sitting propped open on it's pages. He'd been reading). 

"What first?" 

"Hmm?" Ignis asked, feeling his neck go red. Gladio was looking at him expectantly, his thumbs hooked into his joggers, which were riding dangerously low on his hips. 

Gladio smiled--it was comforting this time, not predatory. "Coffee or ice?" He asked amicably, before tapping his side again with his fist. Ignis swallowed harshly. What to say? _Sorry, no, you misunderstood me. I've come to--_

Ignis doesn't know how to finish his statement in his own bloody head. 

"Coffee, then," Gladio laughed gruffly, nodding toward the space. "Go ahead and get comfortable, if you want. Sorry there's not much furniture yet. Oh, if you wanna change clothes, it's the box in the left corner, by the tv." 

"Change?" Ignis reiterated, causing Gladio to lift his head from his work in the kitchen, nodding. 

"Yeah--you'll freeze to death in those clothes, Iggy. Get under the covers at least. Whose gonna change the princeling's diapers if you're ill disposed?"

Gladio caught Ignis' glare immediately and dropped it, heating the water silently. 

Ignis doesn't ask about the apartment--he wasn't sure what he had been expecting, but  Gladiolus was an Amicitia--Amicitia's don't just venture onto their own and live commonly because they feel like it. 

Ignis realized there's so much about Gladiolus he doesn't know. 

Ignis jumped nearly out of his skin when a hand plucked at his suspenders, shaking him a little. "I said get out of these and put on something of mine," Gladio ordered, and Ignis followed instructions immediately. To his credit, Gladio doesn't smirk, just nodded in thanks, as if Ignis has appeased him.  

He wondered briefly if this was how Noct felt, blindly obeying Ignis' orders. 

"What's eating you?" Gladio demanded, sliding into the bed and watching Ignis slide his shirt off his shoulders--he ignores the jolt in his stomach, he's a twenty year old goddamn man and he was a professional, he could handle this--because he can tell the advisor isn't at his top game. 

Maybe this was an Ignis he hadn't seen yet. Ignis, after hours. Ignis, deadeyed and jaded at nineteen. Gladio remembered nineteen, obviously. It had been fun in an alarming kind of way--miserable and wonderful and stupid. Gladiolus had always been stupid, however, reckless. 

Ignis wasn't.

Which makes Gladio wonder why Ignis is standing in his boxer shorts, staring down at where Gladio was lazed against the mattress. His brain played the words over and over again, _tell the kid to put on your sweats, tell the kid to get under the covers, tell the kids he's a good friend. Don't fucking flirt with him anymore._ Instead, Gladio just slid to the side of the mattress, hooking his jaw toward the bed to indicate the space beside him. "C'mere, you're gonna freeze." 

Gladio had never seen Ignis this calm, this still. Sure, those were specifically Ignis adjectives, and yet there's something too quiet about him that Gladio doesn't recognize until Ignis was pulling the covers over himself, his pale skin covered in wet goosebumps from where the rain has slicked his skin. Behind his glasses, still decorated with water droplets, his green eyes were blazing. 

"How's your side?" Gladio asked--refraining from probing with his hand. He wasn't touching Ignis, and Ignis wasn't touching him, and he thought briefly perhaps this was a normal thing. Gladio wouldn't know, he hasn't had many friends--not close, no one to spend the night and to call after he nails a particularly animated blonde girl. Nothing like that, not like what the bratty prince and his little friend have. 

Ignis shrugged, sliding the sheet down--Gladio watched how Ignis practically made a show of swallowing, all very flashy, his adam's apple dipping beneath the pale column of his throat and catching there, as if he were nervous. Why would he be? It's wasn't as if he were practically nude in bed with his coworker, who'd been making passes at him for weeks. Nothing like that. 

Gladio was losing his fucking mind. 

There's a purple and blue web of bruising along Ignis' ribcage, already beginning to brown around the edges. It runs like a watercolor from just below his chest all the way his hip bone, eclipsed now by the powder blue band of his boxer shorts. He was leaning out to give Gladio a better look, and this time Gladio didn't stop himself from reaching out to trace the pattern with his fingertips, lightly because he knows his hands were calloused and uncomfortable, and everything about Ignis was still soft. Ignis cared about that sort of thing. 

Ignis was breathing out of his mouth--a decidedly non-Ignis thing to do--and it gives Gladio pause, his fingertips resting along the dip of his waist, careful not to press and displace any more of the blood under his ivory skin. 

"You wanna talk about what's going on?" Gladio asked finally, withdrawing his hand. Ignis crumbled against the mattress, his eyelids sliding shut, and Gladio decided that this was a horrible nightmare he wanted to forget as soon as he woke. 

But then Ignis was shaking his head, fisting his fingers into his wet hair, grumbling. "I'd prefer if we didn't." 

Gladio was back into that mode, the one where his eyebrows are lowset and his lips are pursed artfully, so that it just frustrates Ignis to the nth degree. "Kid--" 

"Please don't call me that."

"Ignis," Gladio begged, surprised again as the boy rolled himself over onto his stomach, groaning into the mattress.

"Gladiolus, please--" 

" _What?_ " 

"I don't want to talk." 

Gladio grunted. "Fine. We can watch the news."

"No news!" 

"What do you want then?" He nearly shouted, regretting it immediately upon watching Ignis flop lifeless onto the pillow. He rolled just enough to expose part of his face, his wet hair curling around his temples. 

"Do you remember," he whispered. "It was years ago, I wouldn't be surprised if you didn't. You asked me something." 

Gladio quirked an eyebrow, staring down at the boy. He looked small like this, in a way that made Gladio almost uncomfortable, seeing the expanse of Ignis' bare back, the sheets pooled around his waist, staring at Gladio with a lethargic, melancholy gaze. The bed was beginning to warm in a way that it hadn't since Gladio bought the damn thing. "You're gonna have to be more specific, kid." 

Ignis quirked a wry smile. "It was vaguely treasonous," he argued, feeling Gladio's chesty laughter shake the mattress. 

"Then it definitely was me who said it."

Ignis smiled again, sardonically, and Gladio's disappointed to find it doesn't reach his eyes. "You asked me how I could stand to live my life--because you didn't think it belonged to me." 

Gladio has to physically press his lips together to stop the _well, it isn't_ from escaping and crushing him. Gladio just nodded instead, urging him to go on. Ignis shifted, his forehead and wet tangles dangerous close to Gladio's bare him, and Gladio let his eyes slip closed, reminded himself to think of things that weren't Ignis Sciencia's mouth. 

"You always look at me as if you pity me, Gladiolus. I hate it." 

Gladio flinched, digging his fingers into the bedsheets. Ignis was monotone, his face equally blank. Gladio noticed there's a constellation of moles and freckles--sparing, but there--along Ignis' back and neck. 

"You're right, you know," Ignis said suddenly, and it's as if someone has sucked all the air out of his lungs. Ignis tried to imagine Noct's face--small, horrified, betrayed, but all he can see is Noctis, seventeen and ungrateful and absolutely snarling. "It was a waste. All of it. And it's gone." 

"What?" 

" _My life_ ," Ignis growled, sitting up and staring at Gladio with red rimmed eyes and a sneer that shakes Gladio to his core. The advisor's hands are braced on Gladio's thighs, and Ignis hasn't moved, as if he's daring Gladio to push him away. 

"Why'd you come here?" Gladio asked, his hands twitching at his sides. He wanted to grab Ignis by his shoulders and yank him to his chest--he tried to imagine, briefly, the last hug Ignis had. Ignis didn't get hugs, not from anyone. Gladio would do it, gladly and always. 

Ignis was almost crying. Instead, he smiled unconvincingly, reaching up to tap his neck with two fingers the way Gladio had done earlier in the day. "You were right. It seems I've pulled a muscle in my neck. You offered to help." 

Gladio grinned, softly, and he ignored how Ignis sagged against him with the affection. He let his hand reach up to trace along the column of Ignis' throat. "That I did." 

\----

It was nearly two am. 

Gladio had long since shut out the lights, the glow from the tv cast over them--cartoons, not news (Gladio was horrified to find Ignis had never seen Looney Toons, not once in his life. Noctis was a cartoon snob, it would seem. Gladio planned to throttle him next training session). 

Ignis was still breathing oddly, his heart rate too quick. 

Gladio imagined he was in a similar situation. 

Somewhere in the shifting, between Ignis crying and telling Gladio about the night's events and his fight with Noct, the advisor had end up sprawled between the shield's legs, his nose pressed against the column of Gladio's throat, their legs tangled together. 

Gladio regretted not getting rid of the joggers--he can't feel Ignis' ankles properly as they slide up and down his calves, comforting. (He wondered briefly how Ignis knew to do that--surely he and the Prince didn't cuddle.) 

Gladio's hands were sliding down the knobs of Ignis' spine, grasping tightly, occasionally working at the sore muscle in Ignis' shoulder, earning a hiss every so often. 

Ignis' arms were wound around Gladio's neck, his fingers playing with the curls at the nape of his neck--every so often Ignis would scratch soothingly, sending a jolt down his spine. Ignis will shift every few minutes, dragging his nose along his jugular or accidentally tracing his lips along his clavicle. It was worse when Ignis shifted his hips--Gladio fought to keep images in his head that aren't Ignis, aren't his mouth and aren't his slim waist and aren't his long fingers, but he can't.

They had been at this for hours now, awake, shifting, Gladio tracing soft patterns over Ignis' scapula before using his strong hands to  work out the kinks in his sore muscle--Ignis _whined_ and Gladio, Gladio almost did too. 

He knew it was coming--part of him knew, hoped, when he'd seen Ignis standing at his doorstep in the rain--but the past hour was a testament. 

He hadn't thought the flirting would go anywhere, honestly. The jokes in the locker room and the glances in the gym--it was fun, and Gladio liked it. Gladio liked him. Still.

Now they were grasping at each other, Ignis raking his hands lovingly-- _lovingly_ \--down Gladio's sides, because it was two am and Ignis could pretend he was with anyone in the world right now. 

Gladio briefly wondered if Ignis had every done anything like this before. 

It was almost two thirty when Gladio spotted the mole behind Ignis' ear again--he can't help it, he dives for it, his lips pressing just behind Ignis' ear. They lingered there, breathing against his skin, before pulling away. 

To his credit, Ignis doesn't freeze. He was grasping at Gladio's neck, pressing his face closer to his jaw, dragging his hips across Gladio's again in a way that Gladio was quite sure was literally illegal (was it illegal to fool around with the Prince's advisor? Did Gladio care?). 

"Ignis--" Gladio warned, but then Ignis is there, too, his hands cupping the back of Gladio's head, pushing the both of them into the mattress, all the strength Ignis has in him goes into smashing his mouth against Gladio's. 

Gladio almost laughed--it's endearing, as well as painfully obviously he hasn't done this sort of thing before. It wasn't...it wasn't what Gladio would've done, for starters, so Gladio made an attempt to calm him, placing his hands on the boy's cheeks and trying to kiss slower, show Ignis it's alright, they have all night, but Ignis continues to work his jaw in a way that has to be uncomfortable. 

He kissed Gladio like the world was ending. 

Gladio let him. 

Instead, Gladio focused on letting his hands roam, teasing down Ignis' lithe forearms and and bare sides, feeling Ignis hiss into his mouth as Gladio squeezed his bruised hip too tightly. His square hands took hold of his hips, one hand on his good hip and the other pressing tightly with splayed fingers on the small of his back, and Ignis surprised him again by tangling his fingers into Gladio's hair, making another whining noise in the back of his throat that wakes Gladio fully. 

"Ignis," Gladio warned again, the words immediately swallowed by the advisor. What he lacked in skill, Gladio decided, he more than made up with in enthusiasm. 

It's when Ignis began to roll his hips that Gladio had to pause, grabbing Ignis by the shoulders and pulling, staring back at the boy with a wide eyed gaze. He was impressed. 

Ignis' lips were swollen, his pupils blown and eyes heavy lidded, and he was pouting at Gladio. 

"Did I do something wrong?" 

Gladio's heart shouldn't twist--he had a feeling emotions shouldn't be involved in this mess, period, but Ignis is staring at him with those guilty eyes and Gladio feels his stomach turn. 

"No, kiddo, no," Gladio promised, immediately leaning up to kiss him softly, pulling away just as fast. "I just--do you really wanna do this?" 

Ignis shrugged, and Gladio hit him lightly in the shoulder. "That's not an answer." 

"It's why I came over." 

Gladio's whole face goes red. "You--you came over to--?" 

Ignis shrugged again, and Gladio let's his head roll back and groan. "Ignis--" 

"I'm not a kid--" 

"It's not about that," Gladio assured, pushing back Ignis' curls with a free hand, leaning up to kiss him lightly again, and again Ignis chases his mouth. 

"Then stop acting as if you're the adult because you've got experience," Ignis grumbled. He wasn't wearing his glasses, and it made him looking younger. Gladio decided he looks better with them on. 

"It's not that," Gladio reiterated. "I just don't want you to regret doin' this. We can't if it's gonna make work weird."

"It won't," Ignis promised, nosing at Gladio's chest as if it would convince him. Gladio isn't sure that it wouldn't. "It's only that--Gladiolus, I want one day where I get to do something ridiculously ignorant because I'm a human. I want to make a mistake. I want to feel something, Gladio. Please." 

Gladio grinned, tangling his fingers in Ignis' hair. He sighed. It was more than enough, he knew, everything so far. 

He was terrified that it would never happen again. 

"I am ignorant enough for you?" Gladio asked, his hands sliding down to the backs of his bare thighs. Ignis nodded, whispered, "Please." 

Ignis was kissing him again, and Gladio let him go, because it was Ignis' night, because Ignis deserved it. 

Ignis didn't know what it might feel like--the movies made it seem so easy, but also so bland, just a stepping stone. 

Ignis felt safe, more than anything, Gladio's arms around him and on him, caged by his knees as Gladio kissed back, slowly, more like a promise than the fire Ignis thought it would be. 

Ignis couldn't stop the grasping, the way his hands struggled to find hold on something, anything, like he'd explode if Gladio didn't roll him over and kiss all the life out of him. Six, what a way to go. His fingernails bit into Gladio's biceps--Gladio let him. 

\----

"Stop saying you're sorry," Gladio admonished, carding his fingers lightly through Ignis' hair again. Ignis shuddered, pressing another feather kiss to Gladio's clavicle in apology, and Gladio in return pressed one into Ignis' brow. 

"It's embarrassing to say the least," Ignis mumbled, shifting again. They're tangled around the knees now--the less contact, the better, Ignis decided, but Gladio was still holding him around the waist like Ignis didn't just ruin what should've been a fantastic night. 

"'S not embarrassing," Gladio promised. "It happens to everybody. It happened to me." 

"Yeah?" Ignis grinned hopefully, tracing his index finger across Gladio's ribs. "How old were you?" 

"Don't remember." 

"Gladio." 

"I dunno. Maybe...sixteen? Six, the point is, it happens--" 

"I'm nineteen years old, Gladiolus!" 

"And a virgin," he reminded softly, pecking Ignis on the nose in a way that should've been condescending, but was instead endearing. "We couldn't have, ya know, tonight anyway. You just can't. It takes time, Iggy." 

Ignis hummed in frustration, and Gladio chuckled against him, tightening his arms to reassure him, pressing another kiss behind his ear. Gladio liked this Ignis--the one who spoke before he thought and was too tired to care about the consequences. The one who liked Gladio. 

"We can try again, if you want?"

Ignis perked, wide eyed and hopefully, causing Gladio to laugh again, shaking the advisor with the force of it. "Not tonight, kiddo." 

"Then when?" 

"Whenever you want." 

"It may very well be awhile. His Highness is still cross with me." 

Gladio rolled his eyes, but pressed a kiss to the advisor's forehead, before getting ambushed by another onslaught of kisses, less aggressive. The slower Ignis went, the deeper Gladio sunk--Ignis' lips were cracked with the effort, but it didn't stop them from drawing Gladio back in. 

"I can wait."

Ignis smiled, dragging his plush lips across the plain of Gladio's chest, his nails dragging down his hips. 

"You did good, kiddo. You good?" 

Ignis tried to find a word less emphatic than flawless, remarkable, _happy_. In the end, he nodded. 

It was nearly four when Gladio's breathing had slowed and Ignis was tapping anxiously at his cheek. 

"Gladiolus?" 

"You okay, kiddo?" 

"This--this doesn't change anything between us, correct?" 

A pause. 

"Yeah, kid. We're the same us we always were." 

"Perfect," Ignis whispered, his voice a little hoarse. He started to rise before Gladio caught his wrist, dragging him close again. 

"You're staying the night, though," he demanded, pressing the advisor's head to his chest. 

Ignis let him.

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this in like three hours and I'm not too thrilled with how it came out but what can you do am I right ladies haha 
> 
> I'm v tired pls send help 
> 
> What tense is this 
> 
> Thanks for staying to the end


End file.
